


shining at the bottom of the sea

by morphogenesis



Category: Tsuritama
Genre: M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-23
Updated: 2013-12-23
Packaged: 2018-01-05 17:19:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1096508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morphogenesis/pseuds/morphogenesis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>During his senior year, Yuki tries to answer questions about his and Haru's futures, and finds the process more complicated and more simple all at once.</p>
            </blockquote>





	shining at the bottom of the sea

**Author's Note:**

  * For [futuresoon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/futuresoon/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide! Hope you like this!

"Hey Haru, what are you gonna do when the school year ends?"

Tying a knot gave Yuki something else to focus on (as little focus as he needed because tying a knot was like breathing for him now) as he waited to hear Haru's answer.

"Hmmm," Haru held the noise for a long moment, looking out over the water and his own rod lying unattended beside him on the seawall. He'd been the one so anxious to get out of school to go fishing today, and now he wasn't even doing anything? "I'm going to go deep-sea fishing with you again!" 

He nodded, like this was the answer to all life's ills and Yuki would have to come around to his wisdom in time.

"That isn't really what I..." Yuki began, and then quashed the urge to correct the misunderstanding. The longer he could put off hearing the answer to his question, the better, even though he was embarrassed to admit he was still no more ready for Haru to go than the last time Haru had left. "Hey, if you don't hurry up, I'm gonna get the first catch of the day!"

"No you won't!"

This challenge inspired Haru to finish setting up quickly, and soon they were casting together, almost in unison, like they'd done so many times before.

\---

It was November and Yuki spent a lot of time in his room now when he wasn't at school or at work, studying for university entrance exams that were coming up in February. He was well aware he was behind the game compared to a lot of his classmates -- who'd been more sure of what they wanted to do or just had stricter parents and had been studying since the start of the year, maybe before then -- and the stress was causing him to hole up and become short with people.

This didn't really deter Haru, and when they squabbled over space or quiet time, he usually disappeared for a little bit and Yuki would find him later nursing a flower box or chattering to Urara about something he suspected was about their home planet, but was so incomprehensible he couldn't quite grasp it.

They settled into different routines for awhile, and soon Haru stopped coming by his room in the evening to talk. 

Yuki didn't even realize he'd missed the contact until it stopped coming.

Now they lived in the same house, went to the same school, and walked the same routes around town together, but the rift between their near-futures was quickly growing unignorable, and his phone didn't have any answers for this particular question: _What do I do about my alien best friend?_

One night, he was passing by the kitchen, distracted by needing a book he'd left in the living room, and hardly noticed the activity in the kitchen until he heard Haru's voice: "Kate, sit down! I'll do it, I'll do it."

He peered into the kitchen from around the corner, and saw his grandma's back, and then Haru zoomed into view, carrying dinner dishes and placing them in the sink instead of dropping them like he used to. He was chattering to Kate as he washed them, nodding at her talk about her day and answering her questions about his own.

It was the peaceful domesticity he wouldn't have thought Haru was capable of, all those months ago when he'd first moved in.

He still _broke_ a dish, but he was also the first to spring to clean it up and dispose of the pieces properly, and Yuki had to stop himself from intervening like he would have had to back then.

They're doing fine without me, he thought, and it was strange to him that this occurred and he wasn't even worried -- just accepting, calm.

He was so lost in exploring that feeling that he didn't at first realize that their conversation had drifted to him until he heard his name:

"...Do you think Yuki will go far away?" Haru asked, his voice soft but still audible over the slosh of water.

"I don't think so. He's only looked at universities that are close enough to home that he can keep visiting, but even if he did, he wouldn't really be gone."

"He'd still visit us?"

"Yes, and he'd still be in our thoughts. Remember the flowers that were me?"

"Yeah!" Haru seemed to perk up at this. "We should pick some flowers that are Yuki for when he leaves!"

Kate laughed gently. "That's a great idea, Haru. But try not to worry about it too much -- you still have a lot of time left with Yuki before he goes anywhere."

"Okay,"

Yuki stepped back from the conversation after hearing that, his stomach burning slightly with unnameable feelings -- or rather, unexplorable at the moment. 

He retrieved his book silently and went back upstairs, and vowed to ask Haru about this all later, without stopping himself this time.

\---

"Hey Yuki!"

Haru waved cheerfully from where he was sitting on the edge of a flower bed. Even when it wasn't in full bloom, he liked to come here to sit. It was His Space like Yuki's room or Coco and Urara's bowls were theirs. 

"Hey, Haru, we haven't gone fishing in awhile have we?"

"Nope!"

He didn't even have to finish his thought, Haru was already racing past him yelling he'd grab their gear.

They made the walk to the pier in companionable silence -- well, silence for Haru was occasionally intercut with bursts of his thoughts, and Yuki mostly nodded at them or gave single-sentence answers. Too much was going on in his head to focus properly, but instead of feeling like he was drowning he felt like he was burning up from the inside.

He let them get set up, make their usual competitive bet, and cast before he tried to ask: "Are you thinking of staying here after school ends?"

"Um...I don't know," Haru said, tilting his head and pretending to be extremely interested in a bird circling overhead. "We still have to go deep-sea fishing before I can make a decision!"

"I overheard you talking to Grandma the other day. You can tell me the truth," Yuki said quietly, staring straight ahead.

"But, Yuki...I really don't know! I asked Coco and Urara and Kate and Natsuki and Akira and --" He listed a few more people to his already lengthy list before pausing. "And everybody listened but nobody could tell me what to do! I don't know what to do, I just know what I want."

Yuki blinked, and finally looked at Haru, who was looking back at him. Their eyes met briefly, and he felt charged by the contact. "What do you want?"

"I want to stay with you! But you're going to university and I don't want to follow you there. I want to stay at Enoshima, but I know you can't."

Yuki bit his lip, looked back at the water for a moment, at his line sinking listlessly below the surface, and said, "And I don't want to make you wait for me here. It's not fair."  


"So what do we do?"

Yuki looked back at Haru, who was looking at him with sadness and trust, and he smiled at him. "Well, we finish our fishing contest, first."

Haru nodded at him, and they had the fiercest match, rivaled only by the ones they'd get into when the other half of their foursome was with them.

And even though he felt like they'd asked more questions than they'd answered, Yuki found himself laughing at Haru's dismay when Yuki beat him in the first round; getting lost in the competitive banter of the second round; and tasting victory at the measuring only to have it snatched from his hands by Haru's catch that was a quarter of an inch longer than his. 

It was getting dark by the time they'd finished that round, and had to call it in early, trundling back home. 

The questions began to pop up again on this walk. 

"Do you wanna go back to your home planet someday?"

"Yeah! It's super cool there! But I want to stay in Enoshima a little longer, too. Yuki's here and so are all of my friends! If you go to university in Yokohama, are you going to come back to visit?"

"Of course -- I'm not gonna disappear forever."

Haru visibly relaxed at this, and he gave Yuki a small smile. "...Kate said the decision was up to me; even if you go, I can stay with her as long as I want to. I really wanted to do that, but I was scared I'd be in your way."

"Why? I, uh..." He focused intensely on Haru's collar as he said: "The house is better when you're there. I'd like it if you stayed and I could come home to you, if you didn't mind being alone."

Haru became effervescent at this, and threw an arm around Yuki's shoulders. "I won't be alone! I'd have all my friends and Hemingway and I'd use all the time to get better at fishing than you!"

"Don't hold your breath!"

They laughed, Haru still knitted against his side even after they'd quieted, and in the moment something clicked for Yuki. He didn't even have time to be scared as he leaned over and gave him a kiss, chaste and barely pressing for longer than a few seconds.

When he pulled away, stepping out of Haru's touch like he'd done something wrong, the fear crashed into him for a second like the familiar wave, until he saw Haru smile at him like usual, face flushed, and then demand to know why he'd stopped, coming at him with a fishfaced pucker that made Yuki laugh against his mouth.

There were a lot of questions he didn't know how to answer yet, and there would be more questions still, but right now he understood what he needed to about Haru, himself, and them perfectly.


End file.
